Truth in fiction, humor in life movies

Bernie (new 11/5)

★★★★☆

Richard Linklater’s latest movie, Bernie (2012), is one of his best, a
complex comedy based on a true story and told through layers of gossip.
Jack Black—returning to work with Linklater for the first time since
School of Rock—stars as the title character, an odd duck who works as
an assistant mortician in Carthage, Texas, and sings in the church choir
on his days off. He also spends his spare time taking care of elderly
widows; one such widow is the cranky old Marjorie Nugent (Shirley
MacLaine), who turns Bernie into her much-abused personal assistant. The
real story is one of murder, however, and Linklater uses actual
transcripts from interviews taken at the time to film “townspeople”
commenting upon Bernie and his actions in-between scenes. To round
things out, Matthew McConaughey gives a terrific performance as District
Attorney Danny Buck, who is out to get Bernie.

Winnebago Man

Winnebago Man

★★★☆☆

It’s hard to find anything quite like Bernie, but the documentary
Winnebago Man (2010) is equally funny and bizarre, and also tells a true
story. In the 1980s, a man named Jack Rebney made an industrial film for
the Winnebago company. A tape of outtakes, featuring amazing, amusing
profanity-filled tirades, was assembled and began to circulate. Years
later, it continued to be a viral phenomenon on YouTube. (You can see it
here.) Now filmmaker Ben Steinbauer decides to find out what happened to
the real Rebney, and the answer isn’t quite what anyone would have
expected.

Crop Circles: The Quest for Truth (expiring 11/8)

★★★☆☆

Released on the heels of M. Night Shyamalan’s successful Signs, the
documentary Crop Circles: The Quest for Truth (2002) could have been a
cheap cash-in attempt. But in reality it comes from Oscar-nominated
director William Gazecki (Waco: The Rules of Engagement), and thoroughly explores the mystifying world
of crop circles: Where do these complex series of mathematically perfect
designs come from? After two hours of examining and interviewing, this
film can’t find a logical answer. Suddenly, life on earth becomes a
little more interesting.

Religulous

Religulous (expiring 11/16)

★★★☆☆

Comedian and TV host Bill Maher teams up with Borat director Larry Charles for
the documentary Religulous (2008), which purports to dissect many of the
world’s religions. Maher claims that too many people believe in their
particular faith without question, but will resort to violence to defend
their beliefs. He conducts some interesting interviews and discussions
but also resorts to clever editing and cutaways to drive home a comic
point or to ridicule some of his subjects. Regardless, he raises some
interesting concepts, and like the other films here, it gets you
thinking, and laughing.

Not Quite Hollywood

Not Quite Hollywood (expiring 11/6)

★★★★☆

In Australia during the 1970s and 1980s an exploitation film industry
flourished. It created some works of art, some interesting
entertainments, some head-scratching items, and some flat-out junk. Mark
Hartley’s documentary Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation! (2008) celebrates all of it.
Quentin Tarantino is here with his unique viewpoint of many of the
films, and actors like Jamie Lee Curtis and Dennis Hopper describe their
experiences on films like Road Games (pictured) and Mad Dog Morgan. We’re not
talking Oscar-caliber work, but the clips contained here are some of the
most unforgettable stuff around.

Exit Through the Gift Shop

★★★★☆

Speaking of good and bad art, Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010), with
street artist Banksy credited as its director, was another of the most
flat-out entertaining documentaries of its time. It tells the story of a
Frenchman, Thierry Guetta, who begins obsessively documenting his life
on video. Fortunately, through a connected cousin, he becomes interested
in street art and begins making a video about that. His goal is to find
the elusive and secretive Banksy, and then to become an artist himself.
Some have suggested that the movie is a huge joke, which makes it even
more entertaining.

Manhattan

Manhattan (new 11/1)

★★★★★

Woody Allen became one of the most successful of all comedy filmmakers
by putting a little something real into his characters: Fears, doubts,
and worries that just about anyone can tune into and identify with.
Manhattan (1979) is one of his greatest films, and certainly his most
beautiful. The black-and-white cinematography practically glows with
adoration for New York City, and for its women (Diane Keaton, Mariel
Hemingway, Meryl Streep). Thankfully, it’s still hilarious, too.

The Navigator

The Navigator (expiring 11/15)

★★★★★

Another of the all-time great comedy filmmakers, Buster Keaton likewise
gave us a personal touch: A combination of ingenious invention as well as
a little bit of heart. The Navigator (1924) was one of Keaton’s
personal favorites, as well as one of his biggest hits. He stars as
Rollo Treadway, the lazy, ineffectual son of a wealthy family. The plot
eventually puts him alone on a huge ocean liner, with only the girl who
just turned down his marriage proposal to keep him company. Keaton’s
endlessly brilliant gags mainly have to do with the enormous size of the
ship, and how two little people try to adapt to it, but don’t miss the
astounding underwater sequence.

Throw Momma from the Train

Throw Momma from the Train (new 11/1)

★★★☆☆

Some comedy filmmakers express their true personalities by simply being
weird, or showing their dark side, as Danny DeVito did in his
directorial debut Throw Momma from the Train (1987). A twisted version
of Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train, this stars Billy Crystal as a
blocked writer with a nasty ex-wife, and DeVito as a grown man with a
domineering mother; the latter gets the idea to exchange murders.
However, the amazing Anne Ramsey ends up stealing the film as the title
momma; she even earned an Oscar nomination for her performance.

Casa de mi Padre

Casa de mi Padre (new 11/14)

★★★☆☆

Will Ferrell is a guy who seems able to plumb his childhood fears and
desires for an endless amount of comedy material, and though the
all-Spanish Casa de mi Padre (2012) is one of his stranger efforts—and one that only a select audience will get—it definitely contains
some of his most personal touches. He stars as the simple son of a
rancher whose life changes when he realizes that his flashier brother
(Diego Luna) is involved with drug dealers—and also falls for his
brother’s new fiancée, played by Genesis Rodriguez. (The movie is
presented with English subtitles.)

What’s new

Addams Family Values (11/1)

Airheads (11/1)

An Officer and a Gentleman (11/1)

Barton Fink (11/1)

Bloody Sunday (11/1)

Bottle Rocket (11/1)

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (11/1)

Casino Royale [1967] (11/1)

A Cat in Paris (11/6)

The Grapes of Wrath (11/1)

Hombre (11/1)

Khodorkovsky (11/5)

Out of Sight (11/1)

Trees Lounge (11/1)

Expiring soon

Assault on Precinct 13 [1976] (11/15)

The Black Dahlia (11/16)

The Blue Angel (11/15)

Faust (11/15)

The Girlfriend Experience (11/15)

Go West (11/15)

Our Hospitality (11/15)

Sherlock Jr. (11/15)

Swordsman 2 (11/15)

[Streaming movies and TV shows—on services such as Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime Instant Videos—are ephemeral: Here one day, gone the next. The purpose of the Now Streaming series is to alert you to what movies and shows are new to streaming, what you might want to watch before it disappears, and other treasures that are worth checking out.]

Jeffrey M. Anderson

Jeffrey has been a working film critic for more than 14 years. He first fell in love with the movies at age six while watching "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" and served as staff critic for the San Francisco Examiner from 2000 through 2003.More by Jeffrey M. Anderson